Re: make text span a specified musical interval?

[Jace Toronto]

Thanks, everyone who chimed in about this.  I appreciate all the ideas!

On Monday, November 25, 2019, 12:36:41 PM UTC, Wols Lists <address@hidden> 
wrote:
> Off the top of my head, would it be possible to create a new voice just
> for this, and attach the text to a crotchet spacer-note s4? That's what
> I'd try ...

Hi Wol.  That might very well be possible, though I'm not sure how to go about 
it.  This didn't work:

\version "2.18.2"
\relative c' {
  \repeat volta 2 {
    c4^"vamp" r2
    << { \textLengthOn s4-"(Last time only)" }
       { d8 e }
    >> |
  }
  f g a4 r2 |
}

nor did moving the \textLengthOn outside the braces or the <<s.  Is this what 
you're trying to describe, or am I misreading you?

And *should* this work, or does the fact that it doesn't a bug?  The source 
sure looks like it's saying that the text should span the length of a quarter 
note, not an eighth note, yet the latter is what happens.



On Monday, November 25, 2019, 1:19:00 PM UTC, Aaron Hill <address@hidden> wrote:
> Would something like this work?

Aaron, your solution does what I want with the text above the staff, but oddly 
fails if I move the text to below the staff (by changing the ^ to a -).

Additionally, while I confess I don't follow the logic of your solution, I note 
that if I vary the length of the "Last time only" text, it does adjust the 
space before the barline -- but also adds more space between the eighth notes 
if the text is significantly longer, and leaves unnecessary space at the end of 
the bar if the text is significantly shorter.

So, if it can be made to work with the text below the staff, it'd be an 
improvement over what I have, but not quite what I'd ideally want, which is for 
text of whatever length to span the space of a quarter note even though it's 
actually attached to two eighth notes.  It seems such a conceptually simple 
thing, I'm not sure why the solution is so elusive.



On Tuesday, November 26, 2019, 1:05:41 AM UTC, Kieren MacMillan 
<address@hidden> wrote:
> While slightly more verbose, perhaps it’s more semantically correct
> to do something like this?

Thanks, Kieren.  This solution seems to regard the "last time only" note as a 
rehearsal mark, which then affects the way actual rehearsal marks are displayed 
(and also prevents the text from being below the staff).

You were the one asking about this (in a different context) back in that 2008 
thread.  I take it you never found a general-purpose solution, perhaps 
involving TextSpanners, as Carl had suggested?